why gut health matters series

This is the last segment of the Why Gut Health Matters series, but today I’m not sharing new information with you; I’m simply sharing it all in a different way — a shareable way! While 6-weeks of blog posts couldn’t possibly cover every detail of how the gut affects the other systems of the body, I feel like we’ve covered a lot in our time together, and my biggest hope is that what you’ve learned will inspire change in how you perceive your health — and what you might do to improve it.

The Final Step

I want this post to seal the deal for those on the fence about taking action in the name of their health — whether it’s mental health, autoimmunity, skin health, weight, or general digestive troubles. I want to convert the unbelievers, and I want to encourage evangelism to those willing to spread the word!

So I’ve created an infographic that I hope will do the trick. I’ve simplified the message of the last 6 weeks into an illustration that drives the point home: Inflammation is at the root of all disease, and a healthy gut is the first step to solving it. I hope you’ll share this with your friends and family and encourage them to check out the series, which is posted in its entirety as a page in the menu bar on the main CWB home page. It’s all the way to the left — please share it!

Why Gut Health Matters Infographic

–click to view larger–

Sources for the entirety of this series include a 6-credit continuing education seminar presented by Merrily Kuhn, RN, CCRN (r), PhD, ND, PhD and the Institute of Brain Potential (bibliography and references can be viewed here), and information from the following articles, journals, and experts:

As I’m writing this post, for the first time since I started this blog over a year ago, I’m feeling a bit stressed about finishing in time for my regular Tuesday posting schedule. I’ve been working on this series, Why Gut Health Matters, for 6 weeks now, and here in the final stretch, I’m feeling the heat — entirely self-imposed heat, but heat nonetheless.

And how appropriate to start the post this way when I’m sharing the deep connection between gut health and stress. Research is showing that we’re feeling it more than ever, and starting at younger ages than generations before us. While moderate stress from time to time is normal and healthy, it’s chronic stress, both physical and emotional, that can create serious health consequences. And the feedback loop between the gut and the brain can manifest those consequences in myriad ways.

Butterflies

We know from weeks past that there’s a direct line of communication from the brain to the gut and back to the brain again. We know that the enteric nervous system is capable of functioning on its own — without the aid or instruction of the central nervous system. We know that the feeling of butterflies in the stomach right before a race, speech, or performance is an actual physical phenomenon — stress or nervousness actually affects what’s going on in our gut, and that physical sensation is the manifestation of some of those effects.

Worrying Yourself Sick

We’ve all heard that phrase — and we can all probably recall an instance in our lives when we’ve felt it for one reason or another. While situational stress can be appeased by a returned phone call or a safe return of a loved one, what’s happening physically in our bodies might take a bit longer to return to normal. And it’s the chronic, cumulative effect of unyielding stress that causes major damage.

As I said in so many words above, stress alters gut function. It inhibits the production of stomach acid (which can cause SIBO), slows down peristalsis (the movement of digested food), which in turn can lengthen transit time and cause constipation. Interestingly, it can also cause overactive bowels and diarrhea as well. And it can actually increase sensitivity to movements in the gut as well — think painful gas or cramping.

At the same time, the hormonal response to stress in the body can begin a cascade of negative consequences in the overall system, including: leaky gut, toxic liver overload, leaky brain, and eventually systemic disease. You really can worry yourself sick.

Cortisol

image by Maxwell GS on Flickr sourced through Creative Commons

I don’t want to get too deep into the chemistry of the hormonal stress response, but I do want to highlight a very important hormone involved: cortisol. If you’ve heard of Metabolic Syndrome, you’ve heard of cortisol. If you’ve been concerned about your heart health, you’ve heard of cortisol. And if you have extra weight around your midsection and have seen a doctor about it, you’ve probably heard of cortisol.

Released from the adrenal cortex, cortisol is part of the normal stress response. It’s necessary and has its place in our system as a glucose regulator and anti-inflammatory. But when stress is chronic, we can experience adrenal fatigue due to an overproduction of cortisol. Surges of cortisol can kill brain cells, increase belly fat, initiate insulin resistance, suppress the immune system, cause muscle cramps, water retention, hypertension, frequent urination, and foggy-headedness — just to name a few.

When we’re extremely stressed for long periods of time, our adrenals can go from fatigued to entirely burnt out — they begin producing inadequate levels of cortisol, leading to a different set of symptoms: low energy, low sex drive, and weight gain. Earlier, I mentioned the brain-gut feedback loop; well there’s one here too between the adrenals and the gut — a sick gut causes sick adrenals, and sick adrenals cause a sick gut. When we aren’t producing enough cortisol, we are allowing inflammation to run rampant in the gut, and we are at greater risks of developing inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, and IBS.

In other words, we’re looking for that cortisol sweet spot: not too high, not too low. We want to keep our adrenals healthy by mitigating not only the stress in our lives, but also on our bodies. This same cascade of negative effects happens whether you’re on constant deadlines at work, in the middle of a divorce, or constantly eating McDonald’s for dinner.

Stress and Gut Health

“Experimental studies show that psychological stress stagnates normal small intestinal transit time, encourages overgrowth of bacteria, and compromises the intestinal barrier” (source)

The results are in. Stress inflames the gut. It causes gut dysbiosis, reducing the numbers of beneficial bacteria in the gut (such as Bacteroides) and increasing the number of harmful ones such as Clostridium Dificil (aka: C. Diff, which can cause a very nasty infection if allowed to fester). And as I’ve said in nearly every segment of this series, when gut bacteria is out of balance, the gut lining suffers. When the gut lining leaks, an inflammatory immune response is set off, creating the potential for food allergies, IBS, nutrient malabsorbtion, skin disorders, and ultimately a leaky brain.

One Bite at a Time

Taming the stress in our every day lives can feel impossible. After all, we can’t control what goes on around us — the deadlines, the traffic, the money crunch, the screaming baby, the laundry, the dishes — it just goes on and on! How to avoid stress when we can’t avoid the stressors?

It might take commitment, but it’s not a magic trick. As they say, the only way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time. I have four overarching tips for reducing and managing stress, with the caveat that I am by no means an expert at any of them. I work consciously on them nearly every day, but I have far from mastered them (except maybe the one that involves playing with Dexter).

Elephant Rescue in Chiang Mai, Thailand (2012)

Reduce Physical Stress in Every Way Possible

Physical stress reduces our ability to handle emotional stress, and it has fewer uncontrollable variables. I know from personal experience that my hand injury at its worst dramatically shortened my fuse and made even simple decisions a lot more challenging. But we can control a number of physical stressors on the body.

We can control what we eat. If we know we have an allergy or sensitivity to certain foods, we can decide to stay away from those foods and replace them with more nourishing alternatives. Avoiding inflammatory foods like sugar and processed flours and oils is another way to ensure that we aren’t adding unnecessary physical stress to our bodies.

We can control how much we move. Prolonged sitting has been shown to be more hazardous to our health than smoking. Getting up and moving around also increases the feel-good hormones in our bodies and helps us get through the day with more pep in our step. Have you ever noticed that after a full day’s work of sitting in front of the computer, you’re wiped out getting in the car to drive home, but on the weekends when you’re out and about, you have so much more energy? Jokes about work aside, there’s a reason for that — sitting is exhausting and physically stressful.

We can listen to our bodies. This is so hard sometimes, but often our bodies know what’s best for us. We just have to learn to listen and respond accordingly. Part of that is setting up a sound ergonomic work station, taking a break when our eyes are tired from the screen, stretching our wrists, shoulders, and necks after computer sessions, and paying attention when we need a little extra rest.

Create a Sleep Conducive Life

In part 3 of this series (your mood), we talked about the importance of consistent sleep to keep the gut lining sealed. Maintaining a solid sleep routine is also important for lowering cortisol levels and allowing the body to clean up inflammation in the system. Without it, we are at greater risk of developing
a number of diseases, including cancer, type 2 diabetes, depression, and anxiety. Stress disrupts our sleep, keeps cortisol levels high throughout the night, and in turn prevents the body from doing the restorative work it’s mean to do in those hours of nightly rest.

Even though I’ve mentioned the value of sleep in nearly every segment of this series and have already dedicated two full posts to the topic outside of that (here’s the first and here’s the second), it’s so important I’m mentioning it again. Creating an environment in the bedroom that is conducive to proper, restful sleep and reducing device use late into the evening are two steps you can take now to improve your sleep quality. Working on quantity is a slightly bigger challenge, but you can get there through planning and learning to say no when you need to.

Make Room for Mindfulness

With some false starts over the past year or so, I’ve recently embarked on my own mindfulness journey. It can be a challenge to take time every day, but creating awareness moment to moment is the first step toward a more mindful life. Mindfulness and stress aren’t mutually exclusive, but the former can certainly tamp down the effects of the latter. Scientific studies are proving it.

Cultivate Joy and Pleasure

This is where playing with Dexter comes in! Find something that you love — whether it’s taking care of a pet, growing a garden, sitting in the park with a book, or taking a pottery class. Find something that lights you up and make it a priority in your life. Cultivating pleasure is critical to stress management. In our day-to-day lives, especially for parents and caregivers, it’s easy to forget that your needs need to be a priority. And I’m not talking about survival needs, although I’ve heard many people say “I’m so busy I forgot to eat lunch.” No doubt lunch is important, but what we forget is that joy is important. Whether it’s through creative expression, experiencing nature, or laughing at a comedy show, joy is the stuff of life, and when we’re bogged down, it’s a great way to find some relief.

What’s Next?

Friday will seal the deal for this series! I’m exciting to share a little project I’ve been working on to sum up this series and capture it in a way that will help you tell your friends all about what you’ve learned over the last six weeks. Get excited, and have a great, low-stress, joy-filled week!

Sources for this segment of this series include a 6-credit continuing education seminar presented by Merrily Kuhn, RN, CCRN (r), PhD, ND, PhD and the Institute of Brain Potential (bibliography and references can be viewed here), and information from the following articles, journals, and experts:

Ahh acne. We meet again, my nemesis! But this time, I’ve cracked the code, and I’m ready to share it with the world. In this next segment of Why Gut Health Matters, I’m going to address the link between gut health and skin disorders. My personal skin issue has always been acne, but that’s not the only one affected by poor gut health. There’s also rosacea, eczema, psoriasis, and many, many more. While those last two have an auto-immune component (which we briefly covered in this segment of the series), all can be traced back to gut health — or lack thereof — even if they diverge in physical expression.

Myopia in Specialized Medicine

Unfortunately, most dermatologists aren’t trained to ask their patients about their digestion or even consider the possibility of a link between gut health and skin disorders (a connection first scientifically documented in the early 18th century!). I know from personal experience that in my 20 years of battling acne, never once did any physician or aesthetician I saw for my skin troubles ask me about my digestion or my diet. Nor did any of them see a problem with prescribing me round after round of antibiotics along with a Diflucan prescription, knowing that yeast infections would result from the constant antibiotic assault. This was normal — a standard course of dermatological treatment.

Today, if you walked into a psychiatrist’s office presenting with anxiety, you likely wouldn’t mention your constant gas and bloating or your eczema — nor would your doctor ask. You wouldn’t mention your psoriasis or depression to your GI specialist either. But the fact is, most if not all patients with skin disorders also have digestive disorders and mental health challenges. Specialized medicine has cordoned off our bodies into separate parts, ignoring the very real and very documented relationship between certain conditions. Conventional medicine no longer sees us as a complete system, much to the detriment of the whole-person patient.

Bugs Bugs and More Bugs

As I’ve mentioned in all of the previous segments of this series (especially the one addressing the gut as gate keeper), the living bacteria in the gut are integral to our overall health, and that includes skin health. When we take round after round of antibiotics, we aren’t just killing the “bad” bacteria — we’re killing nearly all the bacteria, giving fungi like candida a chance to run rampant in the system. Candida overgrowth results in a whole host of symptoms I don’t have time to go into today, but check out this extensive list to find out if they apply to you. I’ll give you a hint: skin problems is on the list.

Not only is gut bacteria crucial to maintaining healthy skin, so is the bacteria living right on the surface of our bodies. Like those found in the gut, the bugs on our skin protect us from the outside world of potential invaders, and when we kill them all off, it’s open season for everything else in the environment. When skin disorders are treated with antibiotics, the problem might seem to temporarily subside, but at best, it’s a band-aid solution. The cumulative effects of antibiotic use is a net negative, with gut dysbiosis as a common consequence.

Where They Don’t Belong: SIBO and Leaky Gut

SIBO (Small Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth) occurs when the bugs that belong in our large intestine start migrating up into our small intestine. It can also result when bugs from our food don’t get neutralized by the hydrochloric acid (HCl) in our stomachs — inadequate HCl is a major factor in SIBO.

While a very small number of bacteria naturally (and healthily) live in the small intestine, it’s supposed to be a nearly sterile environment. These microscopic interlopers can cause some major problems, one of which is gas. Lots of gas. Most patients with SIBO feel bloated and gassy after meals, especially meals rich in carbohydrates, because those bugs that don’t belong are breaking down their dinner before it gets where it’s supposed to be going. Other symptoms of SIBO include diarrhea, constipation, malabsorption of nutrients, and fatigue. Want to know another type of patient that often has SIBO? Patients with rosacea.

You might be asking what causes low stomach acid. A major cause of low stomach acid will be the topic of the last segment in this series: STRESS.

Let’s connect the dots:
Stress => Low Stomach Acid => SIBO => Rosacea

I’ll delve more deeply into how stress affects the gut next week, but this note from a recent paper should paint the picture for you nicely:

“Experimental studies show that psychological stress stagnates normal small intestinal transit time, encourages overgrowth of bacteria, and compromises the intestinal barrier.” (source)

… which leads me to …

Leaky Gut, which we’ve discussed extensively throughout this series. Leaky gut (aka intestinal permeability) is both the chicken and the egg when it comes to systemic inflammation in the body. A leaky gut allows partially digested food particles into the system, setting off an inflammatory immune response, and the resulting inflammation causes further leaky gut — a destructive cycle that can lead to autoimmune disease if gone unmitigated. (And as I mentioned at the top of the page, psoriasis and eczema are increasingly being seen and treated as autoimmune disease.) As we talked about in the segment on gut health and mood disorders, a leaky gut => a leaky brain => depression. But what I didn’t mention in that segment was this:

Stress => Leaky gut => ACNE

As many as 40% of acne patients also complain of constipation (or other digestive distress). A growing body of research is showing that acne patients have a larger variety of “bad” bacteria in their stool, a greater sensitivity to “bad bugs” (like e. coli) and a higher level of systemic inflammation resulting from leaky gut. If you’ve been following along with this series, you know we’ve come full circle to Your Gut as Your Gate Keeper. Fix the leaks, fix the skin.

Low-temperature electron micrograph of a cluster of E. coli bacteria, magnified 10,000 times. Photo by Eric Erbe, digital colorization by Christopher Pooley, both of USDA, ARS, EMU. Image released by the Agricultural Research Service, ID K11077-1

Fix it!

How to fix a leaky gut? How to clear up SIBO? It turns out, the answer is the same: reduce systemic inflammation by healing the gut wall and increasing the good guys. Stokes and Pillsbury, the pioneering researchers who discovered the gut-brain-skin connection in the early 1900’s, suggested probiotics and cod liver oil to do just that.

Sorry, did you read that whole sentence? IN THE EARLY 1900’S RESEARCHERS WERE RECOMMENDING PROBIOTICS AND COD LIVER OIL FOR SKIN DISORDERS. I’m not one for all caps, but I felt that deserved the emphasis. Imagine me yelling when you read that. WHY don’t conventional medical doctors use this and the subsequent studies supporting this work to inform how they treat their patients?

Probiotics help restore the proper balance of bacteria in the gut, thereby booting out the bad guys that create inflammation and toxins that harm the gut wall.

Cod liver oil is not only rich in Omega 3’s with potent anti-inflammatory and healing properties, it’s also rich in vitamin A, an important nutrient for healthy skin (which you know if you ever took Accutane for your acne).

Enteric-coated peppermint oil, an herbal remedy scientifically proven to relieve symptoms of IBS, is also being explored with promising findings for mitigating SIBO.

And while the research from Stokes and Pillsbury doesn’t cover this last ancient gut-healing solution, I’m going to cite my own anecdotal evidence and add bone broth to the list of tools to heal your gut. Rich in minerals, collagen (aka gelatin), and cartilage, bone broth is the ultimate gut- and skin-healing superfood. You’ve probably seen cosmetics products that boast collagen as a topical ingredient to reduce fine lines and wrinkles and create healthier looking skin. When ingested in the form of bone broth, collagen does a lot more than that.

It promotes a healthy level of stomach acid

It aids in digestion of problematic foods like dairy, legumes, meats, and grains

It coats the lining of the gut to reduce permeability, reduce inflammation, and fill the leaks

It supports a healthy immune system, including white blood cell production

It provides amino acids — the building blocks of muscle in our bodies

It promotes the absorption of minerals, including those already present in the broth, for skeletal support and bone health (source)

My personal success story with bone broth has reached more readers than anything else I’ve posted in a year of writing this blog. I can’t tell you how many people I’ve talked to about bone broth, encouraging them to try it and celebrating with them when they’ve seen results. In combination with a diet rich in probiotic foods and eliminating the trigger foods that create inflammation (for me that was mainly gluten), bone broth changed my life. I’ve recently experimented with adding this fermented cod liver oil and this enteric-coated peppermint oil into my diet out of curiosity (affiliate link). (I like to use myself as a guinea pig from time to time.)

“My worst” didn’t just mean my skin. I was more depressed and heavier than I’d ever been before or since.

What’s Next?

Next week is the last segment of this series on Why Gut Health Matters, where I’ll not only wrap up this discussion but also challenge you to get started in healing your own gut. The end of this series doesn’t have to mean the end of the discussion for you — I’m happy to answer any questions you might have on the topic — just send me a note and we can keep the ball rolling to get your gut health where it needs to be.

FTC DISCLOSURE: This post contains affiliate links, which means I may receive monetary compensation for my endorsement, recommendation, testimonial and/or link to any products or services from this blog. I only link to products that I USE and LOVE. All opinions are my own.

Sources for this segment of the series include a 6-credit continuing education seminar presented by Merrily Kuhn, RN, CCRN (r), PhD, ND, PhD and the Institute of Brain Potential (bibliography and references can be viewed here), and information from the following articles, journals, and experts:

Ok, I feel like I need to preface this post with my distaste for our culture’s tendency to equate weight with beauty. It’s all too easy to get bogged down constantly worrying about our appearance and comparing ourselves to other people. (I’m not immune to this, by the way.) But being healthy and happy is so much more than a number on a scale, and we’re trained — even at insanely young ages, and especially as women — to tie our self-worth to how we look and how much we weigh.

Not only is this culture-wide obsession psychologically damaging, it’s also misguided. Being thin can be a sign of good health, but it’s not always the case. It’s possible to carry some extra weight without any negative health implications, and it’s possible to be “skinny-fat” — skinny on the outside and fat on the inside, damaging your organs with visceral fat. Weight isn’t everything. It’s something, but it’s not everything.

I could fill an entire post with a rant about our misguided emphasis on weight and how damaging “fat shaming” is to folks who struggle, but that’s not what today’s post is about. We’re still continuing the conversation on gut health, so I’m going to put our weight struggles into perspective and give you some tips to help flatten out that seemingly constant uphill battle.

original image sourced from mojzagrebinfo through Creative Commons

Gut Health and Weight Loss

I recognize that this is a sensitive topic, but it’s important to discuss for that very reason. That number on the scale, the muffin top at your side, your pants or dress size … for better or for worse, these things can dictate how we feel — physically and psychologically — and those feelings have can have tremendous effects on how we walk through the world.

Our weight can limit our ability to do even basic things — play with our children, walk up a hill, climb stairs — and as such, it can have a major effect on our self-esteem. Of course I’m not saying that extra weight affects every person’s self-image or every person in general in the same way. I wouldn’t presume to step into anyone else’s shoes. But I will say from experience that carrying even a little bit of extra weight can sometimes cause dramatic shifts in how I feel about myself, and that it’s always so much easier to put it on than it is to take it back off.

So today, we’re going to talk about why our bodies hang onto those extra pounds, what’s happening in our guts when we gain and lose weight, and how healing the gut can make maintaining and losing weight easier and more long-lasting.

Let’s Get Started: Good Bugs

image sourced from OpenClips through Creative Commons

Last week we covered Mood and Gut Health, and I explained how an inflamed gut = an inflamed brain. I talked about the physiological and chemical changes that happen when we have an inflamed gut and how that can lead to mood issues like anxiety and depression.

Are you an anxious eater? Do you “drown your sorrows” in a pint of Ben and Jerry’s when you’re feeling down? Do you have an extra beer or 4 when you’ve had a bad week? Stress (which we’ll get into in another part of this series) has an effect on our gut flora, and the type of gut flora we have affects our mood and our resiliency. But did you know that some gut bacteria can actually make our bodies hold onto fat?

That’s right; if we nurture the wrong types of bacteria in our gut through a poor diet and high-stress lifestyle, they will sabotage our efforts to lose weight by squeezing every last nutrient out of the food we eat and storing it all as fat. It’s also been shown in recent studies that certain gut microbes can dictate our cravings. So maybe it’s not YOU craving that cheesecake at all! It’s the BUGS in your gut telling your brain they want some dinner! Those jerks!

As far as weight gain is concerned, getting the proper mix of bacteria is as important as eating veggies and exercising (and it just so happens that those two things are great for the good bugs!).

We’re Outnumbered!

Did you know we have 10 times more bacterial DNA living in and on our bodies than we do human DNA?

We’re like one giant walking bacteria frat house.

If your house were a 24-hour party, with people coming and going constantly, wouldn’t you want to create an environment that welcomes considerate people who bring delicious appetizers and help you with the dishes instead of jerks who park on your lawn, eat your food, and leave cup rings on your nice wood furniture?? I think so.

By now it should be clear that our gut bacteria affects our bodies in profound ways. But before I go any further, let me back up and talk about the way our bodies work to store and release fat.

Gremlins and Leprechauns

Wait, I think I meant to say ghrelin and leptin. Look, I never said I wasn’t gonna be cheesy in explaining this stuff to you. After the unicorns and dragons from the Gate Keeper post, I figured I might as well throw some more mythical creatures into the mix.

Ghrelin and leptin both control appetite. The former makes you hungry while the latter makes you full. More specifically, ghrelin tells your brain to eat and promotes fat storage, while leptin tells your brain you’ve had enough and encourages fat release.

image sourced from Pimkie through Creative Common

Ghrelin is released from the stomach and pancreas and is activated by the GOAT enzyme high up in the stomach. If you’ve ever looked into bariatric surgery, you might already know that the restriction in the stomach reduces the production of the GOAT enzyme, which reduces or eliminates ghrelin production, allowing patients to feel full with a dramatically reduced amount of food.

Unfortunately, our brains evolved to protect us from starvation at a time when food was a lot harder to come by, so if there isn’t an artificial restriction turning off ghrelin while we’re trying to lose weight, those hunger pangs can be pretty brutal. And if the body thinks we’re starving, it will store every ounce of food we eat as fat — just in case. Adding to that, if we’re already obese, our ghrelin levels are higher than those of our lean buddies, causing greater hunger and a harder time resisting temptations.

Recent findings have also shown that high-fat foods activate the GOAT enzyme, which means that high-fat foods could be making us hungrier and telling our brain to store more of what we’re eating as body fat.

Oh, and one more thing. Sleep deprivation increases ghrelin. Do you find yourself snacking all day long after a terrible night’s sleep? I always thought it was because my body was trying to keep me awake. Now I know it’s that gremlin ghrelin!

It’s not all bad. Ghrelin is also responsible for controlling insulin levels (another hormone that causes weight gain) and stimulating a hormone in the pituitary gland that mobilizes fat tissue and promotes muscle growth. We need ghrelin. It’s not just there to mess with us.

image sourced from SatyrTN through Creative Commons

Leptin is produced in white fat cells and communicates to the brain, “Ok, there’s enough here, get up and move around.” Interestingly, like ghrelin, the more body fat you have, the more leptin you have — counterintuitive isn’t it?

I’ll explain. Have you ever heard the term insulin resistance? It’s a metabolic disorder that leads to type-2 diabetes. Insulin regulates the delivery of glucose into the cells, but when the cell walls no longer properly respond to insulin due to excessive exposure, they resist allowing glucose into the cell. This results in excess glucose in the blood, which then gets stored as fat, in addition to being associated with a number of health problems.

The same thing happens with leptin resistance in brain cells — the cell walls in neurons become resistant to leptin when there’s too much of it floating around. In fact the two hormones leptin and insulin go hand in hand, both intimately linked to inflammation. If you have insulin resistance, you likely have leptin resistance, and vice versa.

The effects of leptin resistance are multi-fold.

Leptin is proinflammatory, which means that when there’s too much of it floating around in the body, it can set off that inflammatory cascade that leads to leaky gut and bad bacteria in the gut.

Leptin inhibits serotonin, so if there’s too much leptin, guess what there’s not enough of … (should I link the mood/gut post again? sure, why not?)

Leptin tells your brain to stop eating, but if the neurons in the brain have closed their doors due to leptin resistance, guess what message isn’t getting received? And then we eat and eat and eat, never feeling satisfied.

What to do? What to do?

This post is about weight loss, not weight gain, right? So how do we set all these bugs and hormones straight? How do we prevent our bodies from sabotaging our efforts to lose body fat?

Chill Out

I’m sure you’ll be shocked to learn that reducing stress is a great place to start. I briefly touched on the negative effects of stress on gut bacteria at the beginning of this post, but reducing stress also helps prevent leptin resistance. And I don’t just mean “OMG deadline!” stress. I mean physical stress caused by things like a Big Mac and fries or a super sized Coke too, which means we need to …

Skip the Junk

Foods high in inflammatory fats (omega 6, trans-fats, and saturated fats from conventionally raised animals) and processed carbs (from white flour and white sugar) not only cause leaky gut and promote the growth of bad bacteria in the gut, they also raise ghrelin and create leptin resistance.

The Right Stuff

Fill your belly with healthy fats from eggs and raw nuts and fiber-rich foods. I’m not talking about Metamucil or some gross processed saw dusty thing to add to your water. I’m talking about whole fruits (not juice), veggies, sweet potatoes, winter squash, and (occasional) whole grains and legumes. (If you need to lose weight, I’d stick to the first 4 for now.) These fiber-rich foods will prevent or inhibit leptin resistance and make losing weight that much easier.

Small and Often

To prevent the starvation response, don’t skip breakfast, and eat smaller, low-glycemic meals throughout the day. Everyone is different in this regard — some people find that eating 3 times a day works for them. Some people find they’re much happier eating 4 to 6 times a day. Either way, don’t let any one meal get too huge — it’s not just the content but the size of the meal that triggers ghrelin.

Get Some Rest

Are my lists in this series starting to seem redundant? Last week we learned that getting a good, consistent sleep pattern going helps promote beneficial bacteria in the gut. This week, I’m telling you that it keeps ghrelin, and therefore hunger, in check during the day.

Step into those Sneakers

And again with the exercise. Isn’t it more motivating to know that exercise is about so much more than just the calories you burn while you’re doing it? Exercise not only increases good gut flora, but it also prevents leptin resistance by converting white fat to brown fat. (I didn’t have enough room to go into these two types of fat, but check out what WebMD has to say about it for the difference between Fit Fat (brown) and Fatal Fat (white).) Those calories you’re burning barely amount to half of all the great things you’re doing for your health just by breaking a sweat.

image sourced from Jmyreen through Creative Commons

What’s Next?

I just threw a lot of information at you. How do you feel about it? Are you ready to start making some changes? Pick something from this list of 6 that you can start working on today — just ONE, no more — and commit to yourself that you’ll keep it going all week. Just start with this week and then reassess next week. You might find that you’re already noticing a difference and are ready to incorporate something else from this list. Maybe you want to stick to the one thing for another week. Either way, that’s ok! It’s just about getting started and making small changes that will last for the long haul! There are still at least two more Why Gut Health Matters posts coming your way, so stay tuned. In the meantime, I’m here to answer any questions you might have. Shoot me an email and I’ll do my best to help.

Did you miss the first three parts of this series? Check them out here!

Sources for this segment of the series include a 6-credit continuing education seminar presented by Merrily Kuhn, RN, CCRN (r), PhD, ND, PhD and the Institute of Brain Potential (bibliography and references can be viewed here), and information from the following articles, journals, and experts:

What if I told you that the phrase “gut feeling” was less of a metaphor and more of a literal experience? What if I told you that what you eat, how well you absorb and synthesize it, and the effect it has on your gut lining could actually alter your moods and behaviors? Would you think twice before you ate that chili cheese dog that gives you heartburn every single time you eat it? Or that milkshake that leaves you bloated and farting for 3 days?

Last week we talked about our gut as “gate keeper,” and how chronic inflammation begets chronic disease. This week, we’re covering gut health and mood. More specifically, how a healthy gut creates a healthy mood. (When I say mood, I mean a mood state, not necessarily a fleeting emotion. Negative mood states present as mood disorders such as anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder. Positive mood states present as relaxation, resilience, happiness, and balance.) There’s a pretty remarkable feedback loop between the gut and the brain — the gut-brain axis — and it starts with the enteric nervous system.

Your Other Brain

Have you ever heard the term “gut brain?” More generally, did you know that our nervous system is comprised of multiple systems that reach far beyond the central nervous system (the brain and spinal cord)? Indeed, the nervous system is split into two major components: the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system. The peripheral nervous system then splits into the autonomic and somatic systems, and part of the autonomic system is what we’ll be talking about today: the enteric nervoussystem.

Embedded in the lining of our gut, the enteric nervous system plays a crucial role in our health and wellbeing, including our emotional health. It has an estimated 100 million neurons — more neurons than our spinal cord — along with its own neurotransmitters and proteins that have the ability to communicate, learn and even remember. It’s entirely autonomous from the central nervous system, governing about 90% of the messages that operate the gut, but the two systems communicate to ensure that our bodies function properly. Because of this unique independence from the brain in our skulls, the enteric nervous system in our bowels is often called our “second brain.”

Now that I’ve given you an Anatomy and Physiology speed round, what does it all mean?

It means your gut does a lot more than extract nutrients from your food and poop out the waste. It has a direct line to the brain, and it’s constantly communicating with it. If your gut is inflamed and leaky, chances are your brain is also inflamed and leaky. You’ve probably heard the term blood-brain barrier; it’s the shield that prevents substances in the blood from flowing freely into the brain, including medications, allergens, antigens, and other inflammatory agents such as excess cortisol or insulin. In short, it’s the brain’s “gate keeper.” Does that sound familiar? We have a blood-gut barrier too, and last week we talked about what happens when that barrier is compromised. Well guess what else is compromised when our gut wall is compromised: our brain wall.

inflamed gut = overactive immune system = inflamed brain = depression

leaky gut = leaky brain

How do I know if I have Leaky Brain??

I mentioned very briefly at the end of last week’s post that mood disorders are a sure-fire sign of a leaky gut/brain. In fact I said, “Find me a person with anxiety and no digestive problems, and I’ll find you a fire-breathing dragon with tiny purple wings at your local pet store.” (That might be the first time in history that I quoted myself.) Here’s a short list of indicators that you could have a leaky gut/brain:

foggy headed-ness

poor concentration

poor short-term memory

depression

anxiety

irritability (short fuse)

hyperactivity (possibly ADHD)

In my first eBook, I shared with you that when I eliminated gluten from my diet, I noticed that I felt more clear-headed and less drowsy and foggy. I noticed not only that redness in my acne-prone skin was reduced, but also that my skin was less sensitive in general. I noticed that I had been waking up every morning with a stuffy nose thinking that was normal.

No, it’s not normal. I had a gluten sensitivity, and it was causing a leaky gut, an overactive immune response, and a leaky brain. When I eliminated gluten and healed my gut with bone broth, all of those symptoms I just mentioned dissipated.

Eating foods that inflame your gut will inflame your brain. A chronic assault on the brain by inflammatory cytokines can eventually cause neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s and Huntington’s disease. If you know that you’re allergic to certain foods, and you continue to eat them, you are guaranteeing a disturbance in your brain, whether it’s as mild as poor performance or as serious as a clinical mood disorder or Parkinson’s.

The Pharmacy in Your Gut

Dopamine

There are equal amounts of dopamine in the brain and in the gut. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that signals reward, motivation, love, and lust, but it’s also responsible for fear, apathy, psychosis, addiction, and ADHD. It’s a powerful chemical that needs to be maintained at proper levels in the body in order to keep that second list of characteristics at bay.

Dopamine also plays a role in our level of satiety and sense of reward when we eat, but we’ll talk about that when we cover weight gain in another part of this series.

Serotonin

95% of the serotonin running through our bodies at any given moment is found and made in the gut, and from there, the brain takes over and converts some of that serotonin into melatonin — the hormone that helps us fall asleep and stay asleep. The food we eat supplies our bodies with the fuel (in the form of tryptophan) to create serotonin. When we eat tryptophan-rich food, the small intestine converts it into 5-HTP, which is then converted to serotonin. Problems arise for our mood if one of those two steps is faulty due to … say it with me! … inflammation. If the small intestine is inflamed and the gut is leaky, we cannot properly convert tryptophan into 5-HTP, which means we don’t make enough serotonin.

Not only is serotonin important for our moods, it’s also important for proper gut motility. If you’ve ever taken an SSRI for anxiety or depression, then you might have experienced some of the digestive disturbances that come along with it.

Melatonin

This one is actually made in the brain, but its synthesis is entirely dependent on serotonin, most of which is found in the gut. If your brain can’t make melatonin, you won’t get good quality sleep. Poor sleep means that our bodies aren’t able to adequately clear inflammation and damaged tissue as we move through the stages of sleep, which means we wake up in the morning just as inflamed as when we went to bed. And the cycle continues.

Low levels of melatonin are also associated with increased risk of cancer — another chronic disease rooted in inflammation.

How to Make Changes Today

Last week we talked about the role of bacteria in keeping the gut lining intact, and this week we covered mood disorders and neurological issues that could result from leaky gut and leaky brain. Addressing gut health will eventually become part of a medical treatment plan for patients with mood disorders, but in the meantime, here are some things you can do:

Lock the gate!

Eliminating processed (inflammatory) foods, drinking bone broth, and feeding the good bacteria is a good place to start. Adding more live cultured foods to your diet, like sauerkraut, kefir, kim chee or the wild pickle recipe I shared on Friday, will help keep those good bugs happy and ensure they stick around and reproduce. Not only are healthy gut bacteria crucial in maintaining the gut lining, they are also crucial in making B-Complex. Deficiencies in B vitamins have been linked to depression, low energy, and decreased cognition.

imaged sourced through Creative Commons from pixababy

Get to bed.

Creating a consistent sleep schedule that follows our circadian rhythm (even on weekends!) will help us get back on track. Doing this not only affects our mood but also the type of bacteria living in the gut, which help perpetuate the good work we’re doing to keep our gut linings sealed.

Studies show that using a morning light box treatment (mimicking the sunrise) is as effective as antidepressants on alleviating depression. Talk to your doctor before starting a light box treatment, as there are some potential side effects that need to be discussed professionally.

Thanksgiving year-round!

No, I don’t mean you should spend more time watching your family pass out on the couch in a food coma; it’s all about that turkey and stuffing (or sweet potatoes, as it were)!Eating foods rich in tryptophan is another way to ensure that you have adequate supplies to make serotonin. But the trick is to make sure you follow it up with a small portion of carbohydrates, which help deliver the goods to the right place for conversion. Of course, at Thanksgiving, we don’t eat anything in moderation, so do with that what you will…

Here’s a quick list of foods rich in tryptophan:

Egg whites (greatest source)

Seaweed

Soy nuts

Cottage cheese

Chicken livers

Turkey (the most famous source due to our relaxed state after Thanksgiving dinner)

Chicken

Tofu

Milk

Hit the Pavement

Research is demonstrating a direct connection between exercise and the growth of good bacteria in the gut. By now, I don’t need to repeat why good bacteria help prevent leaky gut/brain and inflammation.

The endorphins released in exercise also act as a pain reliever and can provide a sense of euphoria for the exerciser — you’ve heard the term “runner’s high.” Not to mention, it just feels good to move, which can increase our self-esteem.

What’s Next?

On Friday I’ll be sharing a delicious, grain-free breakfast recipe rich in tryptophan. In the meantime, have a look at my 2-part series on sleep to find out how you can get your sleep on track to help keep your gut health in order and heal a leaky brain.

In case you missed the first installment of Why Gut Health Matters, check it out here.

Sources for this segment of this series include a 6-credit continuing education seminar presented by Merrily Kuhn, RN, CCRN (r), PhD, ND, PhD and the Institute of Brain Potential (bibliography and references can be viewed here), and information from the following articles, journals, and experts:

In researching and writing this series, I recognize the challenge I face in cleanly separating the interrelated subtopics I laid out last week. So I’m taking one step back to explain the role of the gut as “Gate Keeper” before jumping into the rest. Giving you this visual aid will help you understand the interconnectivity of everything that happens inside our digestive tract with respect to our health, and it will also impress upon you the importance of keeping the gut lining intact.

Because gut health is the cornerstone of overall wellbeing and vitality, what happens in the gut can beget a cascade of symptoms and ailments throughout the body and mind. All the subtopics I laid out for you last week overlap with each other because the source for all of them is arguably the same: leaky gut and the resulting inflammation. So to start, let me explain what those mean and why they matter.

When What’s Outside Comes Inside

The digestive tract (along with our skin) is our main interface with our environment. It acts as a vital barrier to unwelcome invaders and breaks food down into absorbable nutrients that pass through the gut walls and into the blood stream. It’s essential that what we introduce from the outside world that travels inside the gut doesnot pass through the gut lining until it’s been properly broken down. This is why I call the gut lining your body’s “Gate Keeper.”

free image sourced through Creative Commons

When the Gate Isn’t Locked

The barrier function of the gut is one of the most critical aspects of our health. The gate should remain locked and impenetrable until the food inside has been adequately broken down into parts that the rest of our body recognizes as friendly. When that lock is broken, partially digested food particles can enter the blood stream and set off a cascade of negative physiological reactions; the first of which is inflammation.

Inflammation is a healthy, normal part of our immune response. When we have a fever, that’s our immune system ramping up the heat to kill off a foreign invader (a cold or flu). When we eat something that wasn’t cooked properly, we expel it rapidly and experience burning pains in the abdomen — that’s our body keeping us safe from a food-born pathogen. When we scrape our ankle, the area around the cut becomes red, inflamed, as the white blood cells come to clean up the mess and bring in the platelets to scab over the opening. This type of inflammation is part of our Adaptive Immune System — it targets specific invaders and wipes them out, and when it’s working properly it keeps us healthy and alive. Indeed, inflammation is meant to protect us, but when it’s chronic — when our immune system is always turned on and we’re constantly fighting, inflammation can cause serious health problems.

How Chronic Inflammation becomes Chronic Disease

The food particles allowed into the blood stream as a result of an inflamed, leaky gut are made up of partially broken down proteins (short amino acid sequences).

What else is made up of short sequences of amino acids? Pathogens (bacteria, viruses, fungi). These microorganisms actually share some characteristics with partially digested food particles.
So what happens? Our immune system attacks the food — food sensitivities and allergies in the making. Because our immune system creates antibodies that will view this food as a threat going forward, we will now become inflamed when we eat it.

This unicorn is frolicking freely because she just pooped a rainbow with the help of her magical microbes. (free image sourced from imgarcade.com through Creative Commons)

What else is made up of these amino acids? For one, the cells in our own bodies. What about our myelin sheath (the protective coating around the axons of our nerves)? Our joints? Our skin? What if our immune system is so overactive and chronically inflamed that, not only does it start to see the cells of our own bodies as invaders, but the safety levers we have in place to block this auto-immunity are too hot and fatigued to notice? What if our Adaptive Immune System begins to see us as harmful to ourselves??

Answer: Autoimmune diseases like Crohn’s, MS, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Psoriasis, and Lupus. Find me a person with an autoimmune disease without digestive issues, and I will find you a live unicorn with a rainbow mane.

Having a leaky gut will most definitely create chronic inflammation, and chronic inflammation begets chronic disease.

What Causes a Leaky Gut?

We don’t know the extent to which genetics are involved in creating a greater susceptibility for a leaky gut, but we do know that environmental factors play a huge role, and that the effects are reversible if you catch it and address it early. We also know that children who were born of a C-section and not breast-fed are more vulnerable than those born of vaginal birth and breast-fed (source). The list below represents the most significant reasons your gut can become inflamed:

There will always be a percentage of “bad” bacteria in the gut, but they are (or should be) kept in check by the probiotic population — the beneficial bacteria that aid in nutrient breakdown and absorption, mood regulation, and immune response. Taking antibiotics kills both the good and the bad bacteria in the gut, and it can take up to 8 weeks to recolonize after a course. It can take just as long to recover from a food-born illness. If you’ve ever experienced a yeast infection after a round of antibiotics it’s because the good bacteria that were keeping the candida at bay were all killed off by your prescription. You can restore your probiotic colony by eating a diet rich in fermented food and low in sugar, choosing organic, and exercising regularly. And of course these are important to do on a regular basis. We’ll dive more deeply into probiotics in the coming weeks.

image source: Gaspirtz through Creative Commons

2. Food Sensitivity or Allergies

Our body begins to see certain foods as pathogens and creates cytokines (antibodies) to protect us from them, setting off an inflammatory response every time they enter the body. This particular one is a bit confusing, because it’s a chicken/egg problem. Did the leaky gut come before the allergy or did the allergy cause the leaky gut? It’s a commonly identified pattern that patients with one food sensitivity will develop others down the line if measures aren’t taken to throw water on the fire. What causes the initial sensitivity could be genetics or an exposure early in life that excited the immune system before it was strong enough to recognize friend from foe. Children who are born of C-section and not breast-fed are more likely to have both food and environmental sensitivities/allergies than those born through the vaginal canal and fed breast milk. We’ll go more in-depth about why that is and how to take steps for better outcomes later in this series.

3. Stress

Were you waiting for this to come up? Stress, whether it’s emotional or physical, causes leaky gut. I’m going to dedicate a whole post to this one, but suffice it to say that the physiological stress response itself weakens our immune system, promotes inflammation, and creates a hostile environment for beneficial bugs in the gut, which brings us back to the first thing on this list.

What does Chronic Inflammation Look Like?

What should we look for to indicate that we might be struggling with a gut problem that has led to chronic inflammation? How can we prevent it from sending us into full-blown auto-immune disease? I had some readers ask questions about bloat and puffiness, distended belly after eating certain foods, foggy-headedness, and general weight gain. I also had a few people ask me about eczema and acne, chronic yeast infections, middle body weight, and IBS. Yes, these are all signs of chronic inflammation and leaky gut.

free image from Pixababy through creative commons

But something no one asked about was mood. If you have been diagnosed with a mood disorder like anxiety, depression, bipolar, or OCD, you are experiencing a symptom of leaky gut and chronic inflammation. Find me a person with anxiety and no digestive problems, and I’ll find you a fire-breathing dragon with tiny purple wings at your local pet store. In a future post, I will show you why a leaky gut = a leaky brain, but for now I’ll share that 80% of total serotonin in the body is located in enterochromaffin cells in the gut lining, which means that if we don’t have gut integrity, we are likely short on serotonin.

What’s Next?

Wondering what you can do about some of these symptoms right now? Check out my kombucha recipe to get started adding fermented foods into your diet, and stay tuned for Friday’s post to learn how to make another probiotic-rich food. I’ll also explain a little bit more about why that matters. In the meantime, I’d love to know what you’d like to learn about next in this series. I’m deciding between stress and mood — the two are obviously intimately linked. Let me know your thoughts and questions below, and I’ll get the final touches on the next installment of Why Gut Health Matters.

As you probably know, gut health is one of my pet topics. I truly believe that it’s the cornerstone for whole-body and whole-mind health, not just because I had a radical change in my skin after healing my gut, but because volumes of research on this topic have shown that gut health is linked to everything from mood to the immune system; from stress to weight gain; from endocrine disruption to vitamin absorption; and the list goes on. Gut health will determine not only how our bodies function inside our skin, but how we interface with the world around us. In no uncertain terms, it has the power to determine the course of our lives.

photo sourced through Creative Commons (Pixabay – 214522)

A Series on Gut Health

Over the course of the next few weeks, I’m going to dedicate at least one post per week to this series. I’m going to write until I run out of things to say, and in doing so, I’m going to propose some actions steps for you to take if you suspect that your gut health isn’t quite in order. To that end, I don’t know how many I’ll end up writing, but here’s what I have in mind right now, in no particular order.

Under each of these posts should be a subheading that reads: How Inflammation in the Gut Affects Your ________. I’ve spent the last week or so taking a virtual class put together by the Institute for Brain Potential for continuing education credit called Understanding the Gut Brain: Stress, Appetite, Digestion, and Mood. This class, along with hours and hours of research of my own will inform the posts to come.

free image sourced through Creative Commons

We’ll cover good bugs and bad bugs in the gut (aka: microbiota, gut flora, probiotics) and what they might be doing to your health. And we’ll also cover how to get the good bug to bad bug ratio back to ideal. We’ll talk about how the body becomes inflamed from within and how that affects the brain and our autoimmunity, and we’ll also cover how to throw ice on the flames. We’ll talk about just how much control we have over our own appetites and how physical changes inside our bodies can send our weight skyrocketing — and we’ll talk about ways to get that under control too. Overall, this series is going to draw lines connecting gut health (or the absence of it) to a number of ailments I know some of you are living with every day.

It’s too often that I hear about people my age and younger suffering with debilitating autoimmune disease, painful cystic acne or skin problems, a laundry list of allergies, mild or severe mood disorders, and digestive distress that keeps them from venturing too far from the bathroom. I’m certainly not saying that older folks should be suffering from these things any more than those my age and younger, but just as Type 2 Diabetes and fatty liver (both conditions historically referred to as “adult-onset” or reserved for an aging population) are creeping into the lives of younger and younger people, so too are these ailments I’ve listed commonly experienced by the elderly or infirm.

Your Action Required

Either on Facebook or right here in the Comments Section, I’d like to hear from you which topic you’d like me to cover first. I’m sort of working on all of these at once because they’re so interrelated, but if there’s a burning question you have about one of the subtopics I listed above, please let me know that you’d like me to prioritize that one. It’s my goal to give you as much information as I can to motivate you to take action on behalf of your own health — and your own quality of life.

For a sneak peek and general overview of some of the topics into which I’m going to deeply dive, check out Your Single Most Important Health Advice – Heal Your Gut. At the bottom of that post, you’ll find some simple tips to get you started in the process of healing your gut. Pick one to try next week, and I’ll be sure to give you good reason to stick with it over the course of this series.